The city's street improvement plan for this summer costs $4.5 million dollars.

It will target 11 miles of road to be milled and paved, 9.2 miles of preventative maintenance, including crack filling and micro-surfacing, and 1.7 miles of full street reconstruction, including Riverside Drive.

Last year, Binghamton only completed 5.7 miles of milling and paving and less than one mile of full road reconstruction, according to David who said this year's plan is "aggressive."

Crews are starting the project on the west side because Leroy and Beethoven streets, along with others, will be a detour for drivers when work starts on Riverside Drive later this summer.

"We're going to try to keep Riverside Drive open as much as they can with one lane traffic," said Public Works Commissioner Gary Holmes, "But we also know that a lot of traffic is going to be detoured here at times."

The city will be using on a couple of new methods this construction season.

Those include using a cold asphalt recycling process, It's said to reduce one third of the cost of asphalt by reusing old milled road materials.

David said the investment in preventative damage will lead to better roads in the upcoming winters.

"When you're filling the cracks or putting a thin layer of asphalt you are preventing or minimizing the amount of water that can get into the streets," David said, "And expand and contrast which causes the potholes which leads to significant damage."